In 1940 Niemeyer was commissioned by Juscelino Kubitschek, then Prefect of Belo Horizonte, the state capital of Minas Gerais, to design a series of buildings around an artificial lake at Pampulha, a suburb of the city. These buildings (1942-1947), which included a church dedicated to St Francis of Assisi, a casino, restaurant, dance hall and yacht club, brought him international fame. The fluid, curving shapes of the casino (now an art gallery) and restaurant, and the gently rising butterfly roofs of the yacht club, were all examples of Niemeyer's growing vocabulary of free forms, echoed in the landscaping by Roberto Burle Marx.